


forever

by attack_on_toast



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Hospital, I'm Sorry, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-03
Updated: 2016-08-03
Packaged: 2018-07-25 18:38:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7543585
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/attack_on_toast/pseuds/attack_on_toast
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oikawa Tooru is a bubble boy. He’s spent his life trapped in a little white cage. He wishes he could leave, fantasizes about walking the city streets hand in hand with his older sister, just like kids he’s seen on television and read about in picture books.  He wants to be like other kids, running around in the mud, getting into fights, having fun. </p><p>But most of all, he wants to have friends. But he can’t.</p><p>Until he meets Iwaizumi Hajime.</p>
            </blockquote>





	forever

**Author's Note:**

  * For [harajukucrepes](https://archiveofourown.org/users/harajukucrepes/gifts).



> AHHHHH okay so this is the longest thing I've ever written and (like always) i'm not entirely happy with it, but i put a lot of time and effort into this so i hope you like it!!!!
> 
> also pls do keep in mind the warnings it is a hospital au and mcd i'm sorry i'm a mess i tried???
> 
> I'm sorry and @harajukucrepes i hope you like it!!! (or its at least satisfactory lol)
> 
> oh also the dialogue is italicized btw and some of the formatting might be kind of weird sorry eugh
> 
> *edit 8/3/16* There were some formatting issues and such that were pissing me off so i fixed them (hopefully)

Oikawa Tooru is a bubble boy. At least, that’s what people have always called him. He’s spent his life trapped in a little white cage. It’s a cage with colorful drawings on the walls, geometric patterns on the floor, and all of the toys and games he wants, but it’s a cage nonetheless. He wishes he could leave, fantasizes about walking the city streets hand in hand with his older sister, just like kids he’s seen on television and read about in picture books. He wants to see the world, see it for real, not just images in books and videos playing on computer monitors. He wants to be like other kids, running around in the mud, getting into fights, having fun. He wants to have friends. But he can’t.

 

His cage, however kind and homely it seems, still confines him as much as any wire and chain contraption.

 

His mother and older sister visit him every morning and afternoon. His sister brings him trinkets from school, but he is never allowed to touch them or play with them.

 

Tooru feels empty, like something important is missing.

 

Something important _is_ missing.

 

But usually he can convince himself that these visits, the little trinkets, he’s happy with them.

 

Sure, he lives in a hospital room. Sure, he doesn’t remember anyone ever opening the door and letting him out. Sure, he feels so alone, so isolated in his little room, but apparently he’s sick, and if he ever leaves his little room he could die. He doesn’t want to die. He wants to live, to experience the world the way people in his books do.

 

But for now, simply being alive is good enough.

 

His emotions confuse him. They’re so dirty, so messy. _Nothing_ in Tooru’s life is dirty or messy. He doesn’t know what he’s feeling, but he feels empty. By his fifth birthday, he thinks he has himself figured out.

 

_Tooru… Are you… lonely?_

 

His mother seems shocked after he asks her for a friend as a birthday present.

 

She keeps shifting about for the rest of the day, obviously unsettled by his request. Tooru feels guilty for asking, telling her later to forget about it.

 

When his mother and sister leave that night, Tooru wishes he could reach out and touch them, hug them like he always sees in movies, but he contents himself with waving energetically behind the plate of glass that separates them.

 

A few days later, his mother visits him in the middle of the day, dragging behind her a boy with tan skin and a permanently angry expression. He sullenly introduces himself as _Iwaizumi Hajime_ and tells Tooru that _I don’t really want to be here_ and that _my mom is making me talk to you_. Tooru is thrilled.

 

Iwa-chan, as Tooru decides to call his visitor, will visit Tooru every Friday at two thirty, and stay for three hours. Tooru is less thrilled at the prospect of seeing his new best friend only once a week.

 

But it’s good enough.

 

Iwa-chan’s weekly visits usually consist of a lot of Tooru talking and Iwaizumi sitting dully on the other side of their window. But sometimes, if he’s lucky, Tooru can coax a conversation out of the silence. From that, he learns that Iwaizumi has a rare, chronic cancer, and his room is two doors down from Tooru’s. He’s been in and out of this hospital for three months, ever since he turned five. He misses his little sister, who lives two districts away with his father, while he stays in the hospital and his mother lives in a flat down the street. Sometimes he thinks of running away, but he never does. He doesn’t particularly care for Tooru, but he deals with him anyway, mostly because _my mom told me to make friends_ but also a little because _someone has to deal with you_.

 

This makes Tooru smile, and lean forward, squishing his nose and forehead against the glass.

 

_Will you always deal with me, Iwa-chan?_

 

This makes Iwaizumi blush slightly and stare at the shiny white floor on his side of the window.

 

_Have you always been this annoying?_

 

His words lack bite, and his slight smile gives him away.

 

A few seconds later, Iwaizumi straightens and raps his knuckles against the window where Tooru is leaning, reprimanding him for getting the window dirty.

 

When Iwaizumi leaves that afternoon, Tooru flops onto his bed and stares at the ceiling, contemplating the hidden depths of his best friend.

 

On his seventh birthday, Tooru receives a new bedspread, a Space Rangers IV: Take Back Saturn!! video game, and a new treatment for whatever was making him sick.

 

Every morning and evening a tall, scary woman - clad in what Tooru thought looked like a space suit - would enter his room and give him two shots. He hated the shots. They made him sore and tired and sometimes he wouldn't be able to move for hours afterwards. But he dealt with it because getting the shots made his mom and his doctors happy, and when his mom and his doctors were happy, they let him see Iwaizumi more often, which made him very happy.

 

Tooru worries sometimes about the lady administering his shots - she always looks like she's tasting something bad. One time Tooru offers her a piece of gum from a pack that one of the doctors brought him.

 

Despite the doctors' hopes, the treatment doesn't take.

 

Tooru doesn’t really see why this concerned everyone so much, why the news warranted careful discussion with him and his tearful mother.  Even if this treatment wasn’t working, there were always different ones to try. And more than that, he had plenty of time - according to his research, the average human lived for seventy years, and he had just turned seven. He points this out to his mother, and she sighs and gives him a tight, watery smile. She tells him that he’s right, that he does have time, and that their current arrangement - locked in a room with only one window, was only temporary.

 

_Just for a little longer, Tooru._

 

He’s not really happy, with it, of course. He’d rather be living his life _now_ , instead of waiting. But for a boy who's never left his room, a little bit of hope is good enough.

 

But ‘just a little longer’ stretches from a couple of months into a couple of years and Tooru’s tenth birthday rolls around without any new developments. His birthday is greeted with great ceremony, complete with presents, cake, and his mother’s tearful words about how she’s _so proud of her little boy_ and that _Tooru is such a fighter, he gives me courage_ . Iwazumi doesn’t say much, as usual, but when Tooru’s mother asks him what he thinks of her son he looks at Tooru and admits that _he’s okay, I guess._ It’s probably Tooru’s favorite birthday present.

 

A few months later, while he’s occupied with a new video game, his mother comes and talks to him about another treatment option. Most of what she says flies right over his head, but she seems excited, so Tooru is excited too.

 

This new treatment requires weekly shots, deep ones that completely immobilize him for days and days. It hurts him not to move, and he can’t imagine living like this, but his doctors assure him that the effects will lessen as the treatment progresses.

 

Which is all very well, but ‘as the treatment progresses’ is in the future and he hurts _now._ Sometimes the treatments prevent him from meeting Iwaizumi and it’s those times that Tooru is unashamed to scream and cry and kick against his bedframe from his position trapped on his bed with an IV inserted in his arm.

 

The doctor’s aren’t lying, and by the time he turns thirteen the effects of the treatment are so minimal that he can barely feel them. Better than that, the treatment works, and according to his mother soon he’ll be allowed to roam the halls of the third floor of the hospital as he pleases.

 

He tells Iwaizumi as much the next time they meet, but he seems less thrilled at the prospect than Tooru had hoped.

 

 _It might take some time for him to come to terms_ , Tooru’s mother says. _He’s been going on and off treatments for years, and none of them have been working._

 

His mother’s explanation confuses Tooru even more. What would Iwaizumi need to come to terms over? Why can’t he just get some kind of treatment to make him better too?

 

He asks Iwaizumi the next time they see each other.

 

 _Because I’m not like you, stupid! I don’t get everything handed to me on a silver platter! Nobody is crying around, calling me strong or inspirational! No one cares about me, and everyone cares about you -_ Iwaizumi is shouting now - _you don’t even do anything, you just lie there and scream and you get what you want, you get treated, you get cured!_

 

Iwaizumi is frozen, his eyes widened in horror and fear in an expression that Tooru can only assume mirrors his own. He stands abruptly and takes off down the hallway, leaving Tooru staring after him.

 

It takes a few minutes for the tears to come, and when the come they don’t stop. Tooru can’t bring himself to move, he just stays, sitting crosslegged on the ground, facing the window, his face contorted in misery. When his mother runs to him, asking him what’s wrong, he can’t help but hear Iwaizumi’s words echo in his skull.

 

_You just sit there and scream and you get what you want!_

 

Tooru quickly shakes his head, brushing off his mother’s words, and wipes his face.

 

He doesn’t sleep much that night or the next, his mind switching between being angry at Iwaizumi and worrying about the truth behind his words. Somehow, even the prospect of  being let out of his room seems to be less exciting as before, now that Iwaizumi won’t be there with him.

 

When the sun finally cracks through his blinds and reaches Tooru’s eyes he blinks them open not sure when, or even if, he actually slept. The first thing that hits him is a wave of euphoria when he remembers that today he’ll finally be allowed out of his room - followed immediately by the crashing horror as he remembered that his best friend wouldn’t be there with him.

 

After nearly an hour of listening to his doctors and mother tell him the numerous things he couldn’t do (touch anything; take of his gloves, shoes, jacket, or any of the other protective gear he had on; bother any other doctors or patients; touch anything) he finally makes his way out of the door, out in the real world for the first time ever.

 

Across from him, leaning on the wall, with his hands stuck in his pockets, is a boy wearing a sullen expression. He looks up when Tooru exits the room, opening his mouth as if to say something. Tooru doesn’t let him, running over and tackling him in a hug, whispering _I’m sorry, I’m so sorry_ into his ear. Iwaizumi is frozen for a second, seemingly at loss for words, before wrapping his own arms around Tooru and telling him _shut up idiot, I was being stupid_. Tooru holds on to Iwaizumi for a few more moments, ignoring his mother’s high pitched protests.

 

Even after releasing Iwaizumi from his embrace, Tooru doesn’t let him go, grabbing his shoulders, then reaching up to touch his face. He doesn’t realize he’s saying anything, but Iwaizumi’s flushed cheeks and hissed _of course I’m real you idiot_ alerts him to his own hoarse whispers of _you’re real, you’re real_.

 

Suddenly Tooru flips around to run towards his mother and envelops her in a hug as well. After a moment of protest she gives up and hugs him back, holding him tightly.

 

When he finally lets go he straightens and looks around the hallway. No matter how many times he reminds himself that he's still sick, that he's still trapped by the needs of his own body, free range of an entire floor of the hospital seems a lot like freedom to him.

 

His freedom doesn't last forever, and soon enough he’s being locked into his room once more, but Tooru is contented enough. He has his corner of freedom, and he has his Iwa-chan.

 

_I’m in remission._

 

Iwaizumi’s announcement comes as a complete surprise to Tooru, and the implications take a moment before dawning on him. His first reaction is one of joy - remission is everything to cancer patients like Iwaizumi. But there’s another reaction too, an emotion that’s cold and selfish and Tooru hates himself for feeling. But Tooru is sixteen now, he can hide it. He can ignore the toxic thoughts that pollute his mind.

 

He can hide it, it seems, from everyone except his best friend. Or maybe Iwaizumi was only thinking back to his own emotions from a few years ago - either way, despite Tooru’s best efforts to put up his brightest, happiest, most supportive face he can tell that Iwaizumi can see through his facade.

 

 _Stop_ . Twenty seven days until Iwaizumi’s release, and Tooru can no longer look him in the eye. _Stop looking at me like that, so pityingly. It’s like I’m some dog that’s going to be put down._ Iwaizumi doesn’t even bother denying, he just reaches over thread his fingers through Tooru’s hair. _I’m sorry._ Tooru abruptly stands up and walks back to his room.

 

It takes eight days for Tooru to listen to what Iwaizumi has to say about the subject. _You’re going to be okay_ . He leans his forehead against the glass, and Tooru does the same. _I’m going to come visit you every week and you’re going to get better and it’s going to be okay._

 

Nineteen days until Iwaizumi’s release and Tooru finally cracks, falling into deep, shaking sobs.

 

_Will you forget me, Iwa-chan?_

_Never._

 

Iwaizumi doesn’t hesitate.

 

Twelve days until Iwaizumi’s release and Tooru feels like his heart might explode. _Tooru, what are you doing?_ What indeed, he wonders, as he leans closer to Iwaizumi, his eyes fluttering closed, and presses their lips together. He feels Iwaizumi stiffen and almost pulls away, but doesn’t. Let Iwaizumi pull away first, his mind tells him, let Iwaizumi reject him first.

 

But he doesn’t.

 

Four days until Iwaizumi’s release and Tooru is too busy kissing him desperately to bother with thinking of his impending departure. They’re lying in Iwaizumi’s bed, alternating between kissing and fantasizing about their life together outside of the hospital. _We’ll get a dog,_ Tooru says, and Iwaizumi murmurs his assent, his mouth occupied with sucking a spot on Tooru’s jaw. _We’ll name it Momo._ Iwaizumi stops, much to Tooru’s displeasure, but only to look up at him with one eyebrow raised. _Momo, really?_ Tooru giggles, and Iwaizumi resumes pressing open mouthed kisses to Tooru’s neck, making him squirm.

 

 _Stay._ Iwaizumi’s hand grabs Tooru’s wrist as he disentangles himself from Iwaizumi’s blankets. Two days until Iwaizumi’s release and both of them are acutely aware of the time slipping by. Tooru thinks of protesting, of the doctors who would probably come and check on him in the middle of the night, of his mother’s inevitable reprimands the next day, but the look on Iwaizumi’s face clears the doubts from his mind. That night he falls asleep with his head nestled under Iwaizumi’s chin and Iwaizumi’s arms wrapped around his waist, the patterns of their breathing syncing into a soothing rhythm as he drifts off.

 

One day until Iwaizumi’s release and Tooru wakes up in his bed clutching on to him for dear life. They spend the day packing up the few possessions that Iwaizumi has. Iwaizumi tries to act somber, but can’t hide his excitement. _I’m going to go to a school, a high school. A real high school Oikawa, can you imagine?_ Tooru tries to match his tone.

 

_Tell me what it’s like, okay Iwa-chan?_

 

Iwaizumi is released to his family early the next morning after a brief, sleepy goodbye kiss. Tooru isn’t allowed to see him off.

 

Tears prick the corners of Tooru’s eyes and, no matter how hard he ignores them, telling himself he’s too old for petty things like tears, they keep coming. He tries to stop them, alternating between berating himself for crying and consoling himself. He tells himself that Iwaizumi’s in a better place now, but that reminds him of dying, which only makes him cry harder.

 

True to his word, Iwaizumi visits Tooru often. Sometimes their time together is quiet, filled with soft breathing and wet kisses, but usually conversation turns to Iwaizumi’s school - or, more rarely, Tooru’s condition.

 

Tooru’s condition had steadily improved, and after more than eighteen years of being locked up in his tiny room, the doctors told him he would soon experience the outside world. _Two more years_ , they said. To Tooru it’s almost too good to be true. For a boy who’s never seen anything beyond the inside of a hospital, the entire world is almost too much for him to comprehend.

 

He tells Iwaizumi later that week, as they lay on his bed. Tooru talks about his excitement, and how he can barely wait for two years to pass. Iwaizumi is excited too, but when Tooru talks about all the things he hopes to see on the outside, a strange look passes over his face. He listens quietly for a few moments, then turns to Tooru. He tells Tooru about a festival that’s happening in town which many of his classmates are attending.

 

_Do you want to go with me?_

 

To say that he’s confused is an understatement. Tooru can’t leave, not yet, no matter how much he wants to, and he reminds Iwaizumi as much. Iwaizumi turns back to face the ceiling with an unreadable look on his face. _Yeah, it was stupid of me to suggest._

 

For the first time it occurs to Tooru that Iwaizumi might be just as lonely as he is.

 

 _No,_ Tooru insists after a moment, _It’s not stupid._ He tells Iwaizumi that he’ll ask his doctor if he can leave. Iwaizumi shrugs and laughs. They both know it’s a lost cause.

 

 _Let me go with you._ The next time Iwaizumi visits Tooru wastes no time in saying what he wants. Iwaizumi shakes his head and reminds Tooru that he’s not healthy enough yet. But still Tooru wheedles. Just one time, one day. _They won’t even notice I’m gone._ He reminds Iwaizumi of all the times when he was little and wanted to run away to see his sister, telling him that this is no different. _Plus, I’ll have you with me, Iwa-chan._

 

_What’s the worst that can happen?_

 

So ideas are formed, plans are made, and dates are set. Iwaizumi raises his eyebrow when Tooru speculates about the ease with which he could leave the hospital. _Confidence_ , Tooru says with a smirk, _can get you anywhere._ Iwaizumi whacks him on the head with a pillow.

 

The dawn of the festival day finds Tooru awake and pacing his room. Despite his excitement the previous night, he can’t help but feel apprehensive. What if something happens? What if he gets lost? What if his mother, or his sister, or even his five year old nephew sees him? His thoughts had kept him up all night, but despite his lack of sleep he isn’t tired at all - he practically buzzes with excited, nervous energy.

 

But no matter how many doubts Tooru had before leaving the hospital, the moment he sets foot outside of the doors, they all disappear.

 

 _Big_ , no - _enormous_ , was the only coherent thought in his head as he looks at the sky above him. Before that morning, the most he had seen of it was through square windows, which did no justice to the sight before him. He stands still for a moment, left hand linked with Iwaizumi’s right, face turned upwards towards the sky, eyes closed. When he finally turns towards Iwaizumi, the other boy is laughing.

 

 _It’s just that I’ve never realized how much I take all of this, you know - being outside and stuff, for granted._ Iwaizumi pauses for a second, looking up to consider the sky. _You do that to me a lot, you know. You remind me about how amazing everything is._ He squeezes Tooru’s hand, then pulls him forward, away from the hospital

 

Tooru is awed by what he sees. He reminds himself that he’s seen all of this before, on the television and on the computer, but being in the middle of it all is so different. In this world, everything is real.

 

It’s like nothing Tooru’s ever experienced before.

 

When his mother calls and asks how his day has been Tooru tells her about visiting the festival with Iwaizumi. His mother laughs. _Oh, Tooru, don’t be silly._ Tooru knows that she doesn’t believe him. He wonders how long it would take for her to realize that he was telling the truth. In a way, he hopes that she never does. He hopes that this day, this little piece of the world that he had discovered, would always stay between him and Iwaizumi.

 

The first day after visiting the festival with Iwaizumi is almost completely uneventful.

 

The the second, third, fourth, and fifth pass in an almost identical manner to the first.

 

On the sixth day, Iwaizumi visits him.

 

On the seventh day, Tooru gets a cough.

 

It’s not bad, it doesn’t hurt, it’s just a cough - that’s what he tells himself anyway. But he can’t shake the feeling that something bad has happened. His fears are confirmed when his doctor, after berating him for ignoring the dangers of the outside world, tells him that he is indeed sick. At first, the word ‘sick’ doesn’t have much of an impact on him - after all, he’s been living under the label ‘sick’ for his entire eighteen year life.

 

As time goes on, though, he begins to realize the implications of the word. That sick, the old one, was one that he had been born with. It was as much a part of his body as his skin or his hair or his teeth, it made up the very bones in his body. It had caused him hardships, but those were from the inside. This sick, the new one, was different. It attacked him from the outside. He couldn’t control it, and that scared him.

 

 _What have you done?_ The question is rhetorical, posed almost jokingly by his sister, but Tooru can’t help but wonder. What _had_ he done? Would he die here? Here, before he got to experience real life, before he had the chance to keep all of the promises he had made to Iwaizumi?

 

Tooru would have laughed at himself for thinking such things if he had the wherewithal. But instead he could do nothing but lay in bed, burning with fever and wasting away. _A simple viral infection_ , the doctors said. Simple viral infections shouldn’t feel like this, it shouldn’t kill him. But it is.

 

At some point in his fever induced haze he realizes that Iwaizumi is with him, alternating between sitting by Tooru’s bed and pacing up and down his room. Tooru attempts to croak out a greeting, but his jaw feels rusted shut, so he just squeezes the hand in his. The action seems to succeed in alerting Iwaizumi that he is, in fact, conscious, but just makes Iwaizumi bite his lip and look away, whispering _I’m sorry_ and _This is all my fault._

 

 _But it’s not!_ Tooru wants to yell at him. It’s his own fault. Actually, it’s the fault of the idiot who decided to walk around at a festival even though he had a viral infection. But whenever he tries to speak, his voice comes out as nails grating across a chalkboard. After a minute Tooru gives up trying to speak, just squeezing Iwaizumi’s hand tightly.

 

Tooru flits in and out of consciousness, sometimes finding himself alone, but usually seeing Iwaizumi by his side. But as time goes on, his periods of consciousness get shorter until he can almost feel the life seeping out from underneath him.

 

 _Tooru,_ the next time he wakes, he sees Iwaizumi leaning over him, one hand on Tooru’s face and the other holding their hands together. _I need to go, but I’ll be right back._ He leans down and kisses Tooru’s cheek. _I love you, Tooru._

 

_I love you too, Hajime._

 

 _I’m sorry Tooru, you can’t see Iwaizumi-kun._ His mother’s voice shakes almost imperceptibly. He begins to protest, but his mother cuts him off with a wave of her hand.

 

_He’s gone, Tooru!_

 

His mother claps her hand over her mouth, eyes wide in horror.

 

 _Gone?_ Tooru feels his breath hitch in his throat, but he’s not going to jump to conclusions - not about this. _Where’s he gone to?_ His mother is shaking her head, one hand still over her mouth, the other clutching his. _Mom, where’s Hajime gone to?_ He’s yelling now, trying to comprehend what she’s saying. He wants nothing more than to grab her shoulders and shake her until she tells him that it’s okay, Iwaizumi isn’t really gone, he’s just visiting his sister or mother or great-aunt twice removed. But instead, he deflates, pierced by the sharp pity in his mother’s eyes.

 

Living in a hospital his entire life, Tooru has heard a lot of euphemisms for death. Passed, departed, crossed, gone, all kinds of words meant to soften the harshness of reality. But never had he thought these words might be used for someone he knew, someone he loved. Somehow, it seems like an insult, just saying that he’s gone. Its as if Hajime is on a vacation to the beach and would come back in a few days.

 

 _How long?_ Tooru stares intently at his hands, unable to meet her eyes. When his mother tells him that it’s been a week, Tooru feels the anger bubble up in his chest once more. _Why didn’t you tell me?_ The question is simple enough, but Tooru’s voice is cold and hard. His mother says something about his doctors wanting him to focus on recovery, but her words sound faint compared to the roar of blood rushing through his ears.

 

After it becomes obvious that he isn’t asking anymore questions, Tooru’s mother continues. He was rushing to the hospital, she said, and was killed in a hit and run. Officers and paramedics were rushed to the scene courtesy of a phone call from a bystander, but it was no use, he was pronounced dead on impact.

Tooru is paralyzed, his mind racing. He isn’t sure how long he sits there, unable to move, speak, or even cry as he tries to comprehend everything he’s just learned. He knows that his mother leaves, pressing a kiss to his cheek. He knows that it’s gotten late enough that the rest of the hospital is asleep - or dead, he thinks coldly, before scolding himself.

 

At some point, a nurse turns off the light and tells him to _get some sleep, honey._ He lies awake in the dark until he sees the first rays of sunlight peek through the blinds. It is only then, after facing the dawn of new day alone, does he cry for the loss of forever.


End file.
